On August 15, 2002, Michael Wayne Short, 50, was found shot in the head on a couch in the garage area of his Oak Level, Virginia home by an employee arriving for work. Investigators then discovered his wife, 36-year-old Mary Short, in their bedroom, also killed by a single gunshot to the head. The couple’s nine-year-old daughter Jennifer was missing, triggering a search that ended six weeks later when her skeletal remains were found in a rural area of Rockingham County, North Carolina, about 30 miles from the family’s home; her cause of death was ruled a gunshot wound to the head.

Phone lines to the Short residence had been cut, a detail that investigators recorded as suggesting a planned attack. The Henry County Sheriff’s Office, Virginia State Police, and the FBI coordinated a long investigation that pursued many leads and questioned numerous persons of interest. Carpenter Gary Bowman, who had disputed a mobile-home move with Michael Short and left for Canada the day after the murders, was located and questioned but was not charged and was cleared by investigators.

More than two decades after the killings, the case remained unsolved as authorities continued to re-examine evidence with new DNA methods and offered a reward for information leading to arrest and conviction. Does anyone with knowledge of the Short family or the Oak Level area in 2002 have information that could help bring answers?